


Haze

by tsukiakari



Category: Nancy Drew (Video Games), Nancy Drew – HER Interactive (Video Games)
Genre: Gen, Mystery
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-07-27
Updated: 2013-08-18
Packaged: 2017-12-21 11:48:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 6,978
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/899961
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tsukiakari/pseuds/tsukiakari
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The year is 1965. On Georgia's isolated Blackrock Island, cousins Jessalyn and Addison Thornton vanish under mysterious and horror-tinged circumstances from Thornton Hall, their ancestral home. Clara Thornton, Jessalyn's mother and the wealthy head of Thornton Clothing Manufacturing, hires a young professional detective to investigate the case and bring the two girls home. Her name? Nancy Drew.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Overture

**Author's Note:**

> This is a complete rewrite of Ghost of Thornton Hall, the 28th game in the Nancy Drew series. The circumstances and characters are based on those in the game's storyline, but the plot is my creation and I chose to set everything in the '60s.
> 
> Constructive criticism is always welcome. Updates might come few and far between at times, so please be patient - I will eventually finish!

The sleek princess phone rings from its place on the nightstand, startling the sleeping figure into movement. A slim white hand emerges from under the pillow and snatches the receiver off the cradle. "Hello? ...Yes, who is this? ...Where?"

Sleep rapidly vanishes from the light female voice, and the figure sits up in bed, reaching over to turn on the bedside lamp. Light pours over the bedroom, bringing out the gentle yellow of the carpet and wallpaper and making the pale red-haired woman squint and rub at her eyes.

"Just a moment, please," she says, and balances the receiver between shoulder and cheek as she opens her nightstand drawer and retrieves pen and paper. "Could you repeat everything from the beginning?"

She scribbles the tiny figures of shorthand onto the paper. "Blackrock Island...boat from Savannah.... All right, Ms. Thornton, I can be there within...excuse me? Ma'am, there's no need for you to have - "

The voice on the other end rises into a harshly audible tone, something close to hysteria or anger. Holding the receiver a cautious distance from her ear, the woman waits, rubbing this time at her forehead in tired patience.

Eventually she returns the receiver to its former position. "Yes, ma'am, I understand. I'll drive to the airport immediately after breakfast. ...Yes...yes, Ms. Thornton. You needn't worry."

The receiver emits a dull click, and the woman replaces it in its cradle. For a moment she sits in bed as though ready to fall back asleep; then she tosses off the blankets and rises to her feet, still carrying pen and paper.

Across the small room is her desk, dark wood piled high with reference material and sheets of handwritten notes. The green-shaded desk lamp blinks into life at a touch of its worn switch, and the woman sits down, chair creaking softly under her weight.

"Dear Dad," she writes. "I'd telephone this message to you, but since you'll be going straight to court this morning, I'm leaving this message at home for you. It's" she glances at the wall clock "around 4:30 in the morning and I've just gotten hired for a case. I'll be leaving later this morning on an early flight. When I arrive I'll contact you again to give you more details. Don't worry, I'll be careful as always. Love, Nancy."


	2. Before the storm

Clara Thornton stands in the airport terminal and waits. Her stomach aches with a medley of caustic emotions - fury, fear, horror, premature grief - all of them churning angrily enough to make her fold her arms across her middle. The crowds around her are faceless, all stylish clothes wrapped around meaningless people. On another day, in another world, she would have seen them as potential customers, men who would buy fedoras and women who would browse skirts and jackets. Now they have no meaning.

It already feels like hours since she first began her wait, standing against the wall and pinned between newspaper racks and a trash can. She fights the urge to lean back against the wall and rest her legs; instead she rummages in her purse for her cigarettes.

"Excuse me."

Clara recognizes the voice in a moment and looks up, her stomach knotting further. The woman standing before her is young and tall, wearing a pale yellow suit, carrying a leather purse. Her titian hair is bobbed in the latest fashion, as though she had it professionally styled moments ago. She exudes gentle confidence, politeness, wealth, professionalism - everything Clara once had before things changed. For an instant Clara's fears are shrouded by a dreading regret.

"You're Clara Thornton?" asks the woman. Without waiting for an answer, she extends a hand gloved in white silk, smiling with a slight edge of pity. "Nancy Drew. Pleasure to meet you."

Clara bites back a smile equally lined with sarcasm and meets the handshake. "The pleasure's all mine, Ms. Drew. Or should I call you Detective Drew, perhaps? I understand that's a title for lady detectives as well in this day and age." She realizes belatedly that the sarcasm has slipped into her tone.

Nancy makes no acknowledgement of it, instead baring her even white teeth in a wider smile. "Yes, that does seem to be the trend," she laughs. "I don't make any pretenses, however, Ms. Thornton. You can simply call me Nancy if you like."

"Very well, then." Clara tries to return the grin and, finding her muscles frozen in something approximating a frown, nods instead. "Call me Clara." The distraction of Nancy's appearance fades from her mind and, without it, her stomach starts to churn restlessly again. "Shall we go?"

\-----

The drive to the docks is a relatively long one, or at least feels that way to Clara. She'd chosen one of the nicest company cars, and paid an employee some negligible overtime to drive it, but Nancy seems only vaguely impressed with the luxury of the leather seats and sparkling black exterior.

Eventually, Clara decides to ignore her entirely. As the car glides smoothly along the coast road, she lights a cigarette and lets its smoke fill the cabin.

A glance at Nancy reveals nothing in the way of discomfort, and Clara sighs in annoyance despite herself. Her patience is already wearing thin with Nancy, her pity, manners, strangely cloying humility. She drags on the cigarette and struggles to turn her anger back toward where it should truly be aimed.

\-----

The hired boat waits at the docks, as Clara had arranged; the small relief of it makes her feel just slightly more charitable. She steps out of the car and thanks the driver, and the engine noise is already fading away by the time they begin to walk toward the boat.

The sky begins to cloud as they climb on board, casting a dull, pallid yellow light over the gray water. Nancy heads to one of the railings, delicately grasping it with both hands and peering into the hazy distance.

"There's not gonna be any wind from here on out, ma'am," shouts the pilot, leaning from the window of the pilot house. "You might wanna step into some shade somewheres."

Clara shoots him as much of a glare as she can muster, feeling his chivalry grate on her like sandpaper. "Thank you, I'm all right." Reluctantly she joins Nancy at the railing.

"How long will it take to reach the island?" Nancy retrieves a pair of sunglasses from her purse and slips them on.

Clara stares down at the gray water oozing around the hull of the boat. "Fifteen minutes, maybe a tad less." In her peripheral vision Nancy nods, but is silent.

In comparison to the drive, it takes very little time to reach Blackrock. For all the time spent away, Clara recognizes the island's familiar contours instantly, and the sight fills her with a gnawing resentment.

She finds herself gritting her teeth and forces herself to relax. "That's Blackrock."

Nancy gazes out at the island, her brow furrowed delicately. "Why, it's smaller than I expected. How many people live there?"

It takes a moment for Clara to find her voice. The faces nearly appear before her eyes, taunting her with the smiles she once knew and the voices she once heard. She had thought it left behind in the distant past, something she would never face again. The only thing left to connect her with those days is the Thornton name, and now she wishes dearly, intensely enough to make her heart ache, that she could have abandoned it as well.

She realizes that Nancy is looking at her, waiting with ignorant curiosity for her answer. She clears her throat.

"Two."


	3. Arrival

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here'll you start to see some changes in the character relationships. I did all this on purpose - it felt right for some reason, and it also helps with my version of the plot.

The shape of Blackrock looms closer bit by bit, its limp trees and stony shores glowing a dull grey in the dim sunlight. For a moment Clara hopes bleakly that she'll fall and crack her head open on some rock the instant she steps ashore.

She realizes belatedly that Nancy is watching her. Her expression is bright with blank curiosity, obviously expecting an explanation. "You said that two people live on Blackrock Island...?" she prods, as though Clara had mentioned the fact hours ago.

Clara's stomach knots further, shooting a sharp ache up her spine, and she clutches the railing, trying to anchor herself with the metal's cool, smooth skin under her fingers. "I suppose I'd better tell you the whole story. We're not moving any faster as it is."

She looks down at the oily water. "Twenty-five years ago, I lived on that island, by the grace of Marianna Thornton. She was the matriarch of the entire family at that time. She owned not only Thornton Hall, but the entire island, the family company, of course, and I dare say a good part of Savannah and the surrounding towns as well. You see, in those days, the Thorntons were something near to a dynasty, young as the family was."

The memories stop her words momentarily - the gentle waves of the hairstyles, the linen frocks and the damp breezes off the ocean, the muted worries of German submarines lurking by Blackrock's beaches. She had dreamt more than once of soldiers invading the hall and setting it on fire, waking in cold trembling sweats and afraid to move for fear her nightmares would come true. Now the thought of Thornton Hall ablaze is nearly a fantasy, something that she only wishes could happen.

"Marianna had a daughter, Charlotte," she forces herself to continue. "She was the heir to the whole family, the whole fortune...by all rights, she and her mother should've lived alone on Blackrock. Me and my sister Harper were only cousins to Charlotte, and we hadn't half her illustrious family. But when we lost our mother, we had no place to go, and Charlotte convinced her mother to take pity on us."

Nancy is silent. Clara glances up at Blackrock again as the glint of a chimney sparks above a tall weeping willow. "Well. In 1940 Charlotte died. Her mother passed away not long afterward. The estate was left to Harper as per Charlotte's will, and she's lived there ever since."

"I see." Nancy nods, her bobbed hair bouncing vaguely. "And the other person?"

Clara's mind is abruptly dragged years forward, leaving a faintly bitter taste lingering in her mouth. "Oh. That'd be Wade, another of our cousins. You see, a few years after inheriting the estate, Harper decided she'd be best off ignoring its obligations. She sold off most everything aside from the island. I ended up in charge of the family company, and Wade...well, he finally recovered from his wanderlust and went to live with Harper."

Nancy nods again and peers out at Blackrock in turn. "May I ask how Charlotte died?" she asks quietly.

"You'll find that out for yourself soon enough." Clara's throat closes firmly around the final two words, choking them out despite her best efforts to sound unconcerned. She takes a deep breath of the air, sickly with salt and the pervading scent of fish, hoping that at least some of her tension is hidden.

The boat turns in a gentle curve as Blackrock creeps closer. Clara catches sight of a small dock and a sepia memory flashes again through her mind, showing her the shrieking seagulls that took flight when she and Harper stepped onto Blackrock for the first time. The same seagulls are there even now, this time on the rocky beach surrounding the dock, pecking absentmindedly at limp seaweed and seeming to study the approaching boat with beady, suspicious eyes.

"We'll be docking any time now," the pilot bellows.

Clara steps back from the railing, her hands moving automatically to her hair in an attempt to perfect the style. Laughter bubbles up in her throat at the futility of it all, and she clears her throat against the bubble of hysteria.

Nancy turns to look at her, removing her sunglasses and tucking them into her purse. Her eyes are a bright, pale blue, a sharp contrast of awareness against the vacant politeness of her expression. "Just so you know, Clara, I'm going to do my very best."

The pressing laughter almost turns to tears, and Clara's palm itches harshly to slap Nancy for her words. Unable to say a word in response, she settles for ignoring the sentence even as it echoes in her mind's ear.

A moment later, the boat slows and drifts to a lazy stop, wedged somewhat in place against the dock. Clara looks down, grasping at the distraction, and feels a surge of something close to nausea at the slick and rotting wood, coated as it is in dim green algae.

The boat's engine rattles to a stop, and the pilot steps out from the pilot house, scratching his ear. "Here we are, ma'am."

Clara fishes more money from her purse, paying no attention to the amount - fifty-dollar bills have no gravity to her anymore - and handing them to the pilot. "Thank you for your help. You're to return here in a week to pick us up."

"Sure thing. Hope things work out pretty well." He shoots her a lopsided grin and, clutching the money in a tight fist, heads back to the pilot house.

Clara sighs as her last hope of being helped onto the dock fades. "Come along," she says to Nancy, and makes her way to where the boat's low hull and the dock meet.

Nancy eyes the dock with slight misgiving, but smiles widely at Clara after only a moment. "Why, it can't be that dangerous, can it? I'll go first." She lifts her skirt slightly with one hand, her silk glove somehow still unstained, and steps onto the dock, balancing herself carefully before bringing her other foot over in turn.

She wobbles for an instant and then glances back, still smiling. Mercifully, no words slip out between her brilliant teeth. Clara avoids the clear intensity of Nancy's gaze and steps onto the dock herself, feeling nearly impatient to get the ritual over with.

Her heels sink sickeningly into the rotting wood as though into flesh, and she shudders. Behind her, the boat's engine roars back into life, settling into a steady chugging as it begins to lumber away.

Nancy is already picking her way cheerfully along the dock toward the beach, her purse bobbing on her arm as she holds out both hands for balance. Clara takes a deep breath, sucking in the air between gritted teeth, and follows suit, wishing that the acid roiling in her stomach would go away.

While Nancy approaches the line of cypresses at the far end of the beach, the last vestiges of the ocean breeze abruptly vanish into a stagnant warmth. Chills run up Clara's arms and she folds her arms across her stomach again, hastily picking her way over the water-worn stones.

A sudden gasp from Nancy makes Clara's gaze snap upwards and ahead. The other woman has stopped entirely, resting a hand against a cypress' trunk; a long feathery strand of Spanish moss brushes at her shoulder, but her attention is completely focused at the forest ahead.

A moment later, a man steps into view, a shotgun slung menacingly over one shoulder. Clara's lungs freeze in momentary shock and she stares at the man's face, struggling to tell if she knows him, even as he lowers the shotgun from his shoulder and casually braces the barrel against his free hand.

"You care to tell me why you're here, miss?" he asks, the question aimed only at Nancy.

Nancy takes a breath to reply, but the man's gaze has already moved on from her and landed on Clara. Another chill ripples down her spine as she finally recognizes the man - behind the graying beard and shaggy hair and the lines worn into his forehead are the dark level eyes of Wade Thornton.


	4. Nobody's fault

Clara's legs carry her forward impulsively and she barely notices it, caught up in staring at Wade's face. The age in him is shocking; she casts her memory back twenty-five years ago and finds no hint of the weariness that lurks in his eyes now.

"Clara?" he says, after a moment. "That you?"

She keeps approaching him, onto dirt that grows softer and softer with each step toward the trees. A shudder runs down her spine from the feeling, as though quicksand will open beneath her and swallow her into the rotting bowels of the land she hates. "Of course it is." She can't keep her voice from brimming with something like resentment. "Don't you tell me I look as much a hermit as you do."

A dark hurt momentarily flashes over his face before his brow furrows in annoyance. "'Course you don't, woman. That doesn't even matter. What on this earth are you doing here?"

Clara remembers Nancy and glances automatically at her. The other woman is watching the scene as though it were a tennis match, with a well-blended mixture of practical nervousness and calm fascination. It's clear that she prefers Clara to explain the situation, although the thought blends up more bitterness in the pit of Clara's stomach.

"You know, don't you?" She reaches out with one hand, bracing herself on the nearest thick cypress trunk and forcing herself to concentrate on the friction of its bark beneath her palm. "You must know Jessie was here, and all."

Wade nods, dark eyes fixed steadily on Clara's face. Despite her efforts, his gaze burns her.

Her patience bleeds out. "Well, then, why don't you give yourself a guess about why I'm here?" she snaps.

"You haven't changed," Wade says, as though she hadn't spoken. "Not an inch different from old Clara and her brooding."

"Oh, you're a fine one to talk about brooding." Clara's throat aches with stress and she ignores it. "Wasn't brooding that took you away from the island, from the company, from this whole blasted family, now, was it? No, where Wade Thornton is concerned, it's nothing that might require any changing."

Wade stares at her for a moment, and in that space of time she feels as vulnerable as an insect drowning in a tepid cup of tea. He shakes his head. "One would think you'd be more concerned about your own daughter."

"How dare you think I'm not?" Out of the corner of her eyes Clara sees Nancy flinch and savors the movement, a small victory. "Why else do you suppose I've come to this godforsaken place? You asked me why I came here. Let me tell you, then. Let me tell you, since you don't seem bright enough to know!"

A humorless smile twists Wade's mouth. "I can guess just fine on my own, thanks. You're not worried a bit about Jess' safety. No, you're here to make sure that girl of yours gets herself back to the mainland and walks up to the altar with that Birchfield boy, before his family gets the proverbial cold feet and says 'maybe, just maybe, the Thornton clan isn't quite as illustrious as they made themselves out to be.' And once you've gotten her safely married off and the future of this fine family has been ensured for generations to come, perhaps you'll even go so far as to give her and cousin Addy a good hiding, eh?"

Clara notes absently that her hands are crooked into fists, so tightly that her nails bite harshly into her palms. She imagines slapping Wade across the face, perhaps even scoring his cheek with her nails, leaving bloody scratches, scratches that will linger and scar and give him the memory of her every time he looks in a mirror. The thought brings no comfort.

"I am here," she forces out, "to look for my daughter and my niece. I hired this private detective" she stabs a finger toward Nancy and nearly smirks at the other woman's somewhat confounded expression "to assist me. If you prefer to believe that I am more invested in my daughter's marriage than I am in her health and well-being, you are quite sorely mistaken and I suggest you keep the opinion to yourself. Now take me to the house."

Again, Wade studies her, and shakes his head quietly. "Yes, ma'am," he says, and turns on his heel, striding back into the forest the way he came.

Clara starts to follow, the momentary glow of superiority warming her body; halfway into the forest she realizes that Nancy is still standing in place and turns back. The other woman is watching the tennis match again, her gaze flashing between Wade's retreating back and Clara's face. Her expression seems almost accusing, or perhaps merely doubtful, but a coat of cool emotionlessness smooths over it almost instantly and she steps forward to Clara's side.


	5. A shadow

The trip through the forest is long and silent. Marshy ground encroaches on the path almost constantly, tufts of grass growing in wild profusion under the heavy canopy of trees. After only minutes, Clara feels haunted and watched, as though the center of every shadow is riddled with eyes. No birdsong lightens the humid, stagnant air.

Wade keeps a steady distance ahead of both Clara and Nancy, never looking back to check on their progress. He brushes by long tendrils of Spanish moss without slowing or paying the slightest attention, whereas Nancy spares them an involuntary glance when they impede her way; Clara feels the nagging impulse to rip them down each time one floats waiflike before her eyes. The island and all its miserable solitude seems to crowd around her, a presence all its own that whispers old and bitter memories.

Eventually the forest comes to an end, breaking out into the endless avenue of cypresses that pave the way to Thornton Hall itself. The sunlight brightens into a dull glare as Clara steps out from under the last shade. The trees in the avenue are all long dead, their warped branches draped with more moss as if in mockery of life. Even in the open there is no breeze, no movement of air however slight. In the distance lurks the dim symmetry of Thornton Hall.

Nancy pauses momentarily, gazing down the avenue as Wade continues along without pause. Breathing in the rank smell of rotting foliage, Clara stops at Nancy's side, laughing to herself at the irony of preferring the other woman's company to Wade's. "Simply breathtaking, isn't it, though?"

Nancy glances at her. The humidity has worked its way through her bob, nearly flattening the curve and making her hair look like a limp imitation of itself. "Well, I suppose so..."

"You needn't lie." Clara's mouth twitches and she struggles to push the amusement back. "Thornton Hall was a monstrosity when I lived in it, and I'm perfectly sure it hasn't changed."

Understanding crosses Nancy's face for perhaps the first time, and she looks back at the mansion again. "You know, I did mean what I said earlier," she says eventually. "I am going to do my very best, and you can count on me entirely."

Somehow the words hold less of a patronizing edge than before, and Clara finds herself accepting them without rancor. "Thank you."

"Shall we?" Nancy smiles and moves down the avenue, walking quickly to close the distance between herself and Wade's distant form.

A small pool of dread trickles into Clara's stomach as she thinks of what awaits her inside Thornton Hall, and her feet linger heavy as lead even while she fights to continue on. She focuses her thoughts on her purpose, but it does no good. She would rather be on the mainland, in her office, even in the most heated and furious stockholder's meeting she can imagine, than on Blackrock. She shoves the thoughts out of her head before they can take root, and walks.

The closer she gets to Thornton Hall, the more dilapidated it looks. The paint has all but crumbled from its walls, leaving them coated in sickly green; the great front pillars are enveloped in strangling tendrils of ivy and half the railings on the upper floor are overgrown with the dark haze of rust. Cypresses lurk dangerously close to the house, their branches nearly brushing the ragged roof. Wade has already reached the porch and stands unmoving there, shadowed by its ceiling.

"It seems built to inspire dread, I think," Nancy murmurs absently.

"Indeed it was." The words slip out before Clara can stop them and she grits her teeth. Nancy glances at her but offers no reply.

They reach the porch. The sagging, battered steps creak heavily as Clara ascends them, making her wince. Wade moves to the front dor and open its, holding it steady like a glowering butler. Nancy steps into Thornton Hall first, and stops barely across the threshold. For a moment Clara wonders why the other woman would be so affected, and then she enters the house and ice crackles into life across her body, holding her sway to a blast of awareness that threatens to knock her to the floor like a sapling in a gale.

The crimson and turquoise of the threadbare carpet, the deep burgundy of the tattered, peeling, moldy wallpaper; the stairs, far across the entryway, leading up to a second floor engulfed in lamplight and shadow; the carved mahogany sets of doors flanking both sides of the room, to parlor on the right and dining room on the left. The rest of the house, a floorplan long blocked from memory, returns to Clara, and she reels.

The unceremonious slam of the front door brings her back, and she turns to see Wade regarding her with something like pity. "She'll be in the parlor this time of day."

As if summoned by his words, the faint ringing of a piano's keys echoes from the parlor, muffled by the dense walls. Above it rises a thin voice, barely in tune with the piano, keeping a different tempo as it rises and falls wordlessly. Clara draws on her sparse reserves of courage and walks to the door, closing her fingers around the handle. The metal sticks to her skin, cold and cloying.

Feeling somehow like an unhappy conqueror, she opens the door.


	6. Lullaby

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The first appearance of Harper.

The room is nearly dark, lit only by the glow of a lamp and the few streaks of light stumbling their way through tightly shuttered windows. As Clara's eyes adjust she sees the same furniture she had once known, the sofa and chairs and coffee table, and the piano at the far end of the room. Sitting there, on the velvety leather bench that had always matched so perfectly with the piano itself, is a person.

The piano's last, sour chord fades into silence under groaning door hinges, and the person turns. Drawn unwillingly toward the magnetism of the sheer movement, Clara steps forward with the bile of panic rising in her throat. Her first sight is an unkempt mess of hair, the same black-brown as her own but intensely curly and tangled. Framed by the matted halo is a face lined with exhaustion, sallow and bloodless, hollow-cheeked and thin. Bony white hands move across a body shrouded in a black dress decades out of date, bringing unconscious and unwanted attention to its frail, skeletal frame.

Harper Thornton looks like death itself.

Clara stops before she can trip over a chair leg or into the piano itself. Tears brim up in her eyes, prickling angrily. She opens her mouth to speak and tastes the foul lamp oil, and can find no words.

Harper looks at her with complete ignorance, blinking slowly. "Wade," she says, in a questioning tone. Her voice is deeper than Clara remembers it, clogged and raspy; she sounds like more of a smoker than any smoker Clara has known. "Wade, who are these people?"

A short silence greets her words, and her face twists in fury. "Wade!" she shrieks. Clara jumps and her heart begins to hammer belatedly in her chest, for all that her eyes are fixed on Harper.

Her sister pays her no attention. Bracing herself with one hand, she rises from the piano bench, her body clearly trembling. "Wade! Answer me!" Her voice is still a scream, and the effort seems to nearly crumple her body in upon itself, making her thin chest rise and fall convulsively. She starts to cough, the sound ragged and deep as though torn from within her.

Wade's footsteps ring out and he pushes his way past Clara, taking Harper's shoulder. "It's all right, I'm right here," he says, voice quiet and shockingly gentle under the hack of Harper's coughs.

Clara stares. The tears spill warm down her cheeks, blotting her vision. All at once she feels close to sickness, closer than any moment before. The Harper of her memories overlays the Harper standing before her, rail-thin and racked with coughing, and the difference fills Clara with horror and the ill restlessness of denial.

Harper's coughs fade and she leans heavily against Wade's shoulder, her eyes drifting shut. "Wade, I'm dreaming again, aren't I?" she murmurs hoarsely. "They aren't here."

"No, no, Harper, they are." Wade looks at Clara and everything he never said is locked up in his dark eyes. "They're real, trust me."

Harper's gaze drifts up to Clara again. "Why, that looks like..." She squints, taking an unsteady step forward, even as Wade holds on to her. "Looks like Clara. My sister. My twin." She all but staggers closer, peering at Clara's face. Fear rims Clara's heart with frost and she keeps still, struggling to hide her trembling.

Abruptly Harper lifts a hand and slaps Clara across the face. The blow stings and Clara can feel every bone in Harper's hand as though it were already a skeleton. Shaken loose, more tears course down her cheeks and her lower lip starts to tremble, growing worse the more she fights it.

"You're real." Harper studies her hand in obvious confusion, rubbing it with tapered fingers. "Clara. My sister."

Her shoulders begin to shake, and she suddenly throws her head back and laughs aloud, the sounds rasping in her throat like sandpaper, even worse than the coughs. Wade hurries forward and rests a hand on her shoulder for support, but she ignores him completely, her whole body caught up in the laughter. Clara can do nothing but watch, her cheek throbbing and her throat aching to sob.

At last Harper's laughter ends as quickly as it began. "Clara," she breathes, panting through a yellowed smile. "Now whatever would you be...ah, why, of course! You're here regarding your Jessielamb, aren't you?"

A switch of clarity flicks somewhere in Clara's head and she starts to shake. Words brim up on her tongue, not one of them strong enough to escape between her lips.

"Yes, yes, of course." Harper is abruptly serious, studying Clara through heartachingly familiar black eyes. "Clara dear, you needn't have come all this way. Jessielamb and little Addie, why, they're all gone. They won't be coming home."

The final dagger hits Clara squarely in the heart, stabbing her with an icicle of frigid pain. "I can't stand this any longer," she spits into Harper's face and turns toward the door, tears blinding her again and making her stumble like an invalid until she reaches the threshold and flees into the entryway. Footsteps follow her, but she pays them no heed.

"Clara." Wade's voice falls heavily onto the threadbare carpet. "Clara, come on."

Torn between turning on him and ignoring him, Clara chooses the former in an instant. "Give me one reason why I should bother? Put yourself in my shoes for five minutes, Wade, if you even care to try. I find that my daughter has run off here, I try to get her back, and then I get word that she and her cousin have disappeared. I take time out from my life, from my work, and I travel here to this rotting...travesty of a home..." She hears her voice cracking into hysteria and forces it back by sheer force of will. "Only to be met by you and...and..."

The image of Harper, emaciated and sallow in the wan lamplight, makes her start sobbing, and she finds herself unable to stop. All around her looms the Thorntons' ancestral home, like a filthy dying presence that judges with nothing but hypocrisy; Wade's form is a blurred and motionless shape, watching her with the same impassiveness. All her pain and worry and premature grief should be turned to dust within the walls of the mansion, yet they sharpen and grow serrated edges the more she weeps.

Endless minutes tick by, and then a soft touch rests on her arm, drawing her back to the present. Clara wipes a hand across her wet face, blotting out the tears, and looks up to see Harper, eyes wide with pity and childish innocence. "Clara, Clara, honey," she whispers. "Don't cry, it's all right." Her voice rises just slightly, melting into a husky croon. "They'll be all right, they'll all be fine. You'll find Jessielamb and little Addie and take them all back home. Everybody will be happy. You'll see."

Still clinging to Clara's sleeve, she turns away, staring into the bowels of the house, and her gaze slowly climbs until she looks directly at the top of the stairs, vacant but somehow with sharp focus. "You'll see, Charlotte. You'll see."


	7. To nowhere

Wade leans against one of the porch pillars and looks absently out on the tree-lined avenue. "They're not dead, Clara, believe me."

"Well, what, then?" Clara folds her arms across her middle, struggling to blot out the sickness of confusion. Harper's touch still tingles on her arm, a tangible reminder. "Wade, you delivered the message yourself, you should know what it said. All I know is that they're...not here, neither of them."

"I do need to know as many details as possible," Nancy puts in, her light voice a harsh contrast to the silence. She stands between Clara and Wade, a figure still fashionable and bright in her yellow suit. Clara barely recalls her presence after entering Thornton Hall.

Wade sighs. "This is what I know, and all of it." He buries his hands in his pockets. "Jess and Addie were staying here, with Harper. I was staying back in the caretaker's cottage, as I do most of the time...until now, at any rate. One evening I go to check on Harper, she's hysterical. When she calms down, she tells me that Jess and Addie were walking down the avenue, when Addie...pulled out a knife, grabbed Jess, and they vanished into the fog."

Cold fear washes over Clara and she grits her teeth.

"I looked around as much as I could that evening, and most of the next day. When I didn't find anything, or anyone, I sent word to you." Wade shrugs. "Clara, you saw your sister. There's no good way of knowing whether she truly saw Addie holding a knife, or if something else happened and her mind...changed the circumstances altogether."

"Harper said..." Clara licks her lips and tastes something bitter, something that lingers in her mouth even as she speaks. "She mentioned Charlotte. You must have heard."

When she turns to Wade, his face is grim. "She's been seeing Charlotte for years, or so she says. I've..." His voice trails off and he shakes his head.

"You've never had the same experience?" Nancy asks bluntly.

Wade looks at her with blank confusion. "'Course not. Blackrock is brimming over with the past, but there are no ghosts here."

"I see..." Nancy nods slowly and peers out at the cypresses as late-morning sun begins to glimmer fitfully through the clouds. "Would it be all right if I looked around the grounds myself. It's perfectly safe so long as I don't wander off, I assume."

"Oh, yeah, of course." Wade seems ready to offer his presence as a guide, but with a glance at Clara he changes his statement. "If you need me, I'll likely be at the caretaker's cottage. You'll find the path at the far left end of the avenue."

"All right, then. Thank you." With an encouraging smile, Nancy descends the porch and sets off across the avenue at a brisk pace. The glow of her clothing stays visible until she eventually turns, heading between two cypresses and vanishing entirely.

"We shouldn't let a girl like that walk around here alone," Wade comments softly.

"I'm certainly not going to stay here alone with Harper." Clara's heart nearly aches at the words, but she forces herself to squarely meet Wade's gaze nonetheless.

Wade's expression turns grim, half-hidden as it is beneath his beard. "Harper may be...a touch different than she was when you were here, but she's not homicidal. She's nowhere near it."

The weight of the situation bears down for what feels like the thousandth time, making Clara rub at her temples although no pain rests in her head. "Wade..." Her throat begins to tighten. "When I left Blackrock, my sister was my sister. She had a predilection toward rising with the sun and reading Bronte in the cemetery, for sure, but she was Harper. I knew her. I understood her. Why, I could confide in her." The tears threaten again, swelling to choke her and drive her voice into silence. "That woman I just saw...I haven't any idea what happened, what has gone on since I left, but that is not the Harper I knew."

Wade looks off along the avenue once again, and his voice is far from sympathetic. "Lot of things can happen in twenty-five years. We Thorntons, of all people, should be well aware of that."

"What happened, though?" Clara sinks down into a crouch, staring at the porch's cracked and peeling paint in lieu of thought. "Twenty-five years doesn't make a person see ghosts."

"I don't know."

After a moment of silence, the inaction grates on Clara's nerves like a dull razor and she rises. Numb hunger gnaws her stomach, making her sigh. "Wade, I honestly don't think I can enter that house again. Would you mind terribly if I went to the caretaker's cottage for lunch?"

He smiles, but the bitter disbelief is gone; a vague breath of cameraderie has seeped into the air, and Clara breathes it with relief. "'Course you can," he nods. "There's an extra room you can stay in, if you're willing to consign Miss Detective to the hall instead. Oh, but..." His voice trails off and he sighs heavily. "After Jess and Addie disappeared, Harper demanded I stay in the hall with her. There's little chance she'll change her mind now that you're here."

The implication knots Clara's stomach again and she shakes her head, trying to drive the idea away. "I can't stay in that house, Wade. I can't."

"To be frank, I'm not perfectly comfortable with your staying alone in the cottage," he retorts. "You can't very well use a shotgun to defend yourself, now, can you?"

"What on earth do you think is on this island, then?" Exasperation sharpens Clara's tone more than she intends. "If you're so very certain that someone else is here, why let Nancy wander off on her own?"

Wade shrugs. "Call it intuition if you like. In my humble opinion, it's only common sense to make certain no one is alone when night falls foggy onto a deserted island."

\-----

Clara spends the next hours at the caretaker's cottage, fighting off the slow and subtle dread of inaction. Wade's food is wholesome enough, most of it grown in the garden just outside the cottage; he and Clara eat outside on the shaded farmer's porch, under the hazy light of the afternoon sun. Despite the warmly gentle breeze drifting in from the bay, the air remains stagnant and still.

When Nancy walks down the shaded path to the cottage, the sun has crept far past its zenith and hovers fitfully somewhere close to the horizon. Nancy walks around a corner of the path, her stride slower and wearier than before, with nearly all the wave and shine gone from her hair. Her expression brightens substantially when she sees Clara and Wade on the cottage porch, and Clara's stomach unknots itself just a bit in grudging relief.

Wade rises from his seat as Nancy ascends the porch steps. "Are you all right, Miss Drew? Didn't run into any trouble?"

"Why, of course not." Nancy smiles, her teeth still brilliantly white even in the dull glow of afternoon. "I just took a walk around the island in preparation for my investigation, that's all."

While Wade disappears into the cottage for another chair, Nancy fishes a piece of paper from her purse and hands it to Clara. "I found this near an old ruined building that looked almost as though it had once caught on fire. I wasn't sure of its safety, so I didn't go near it after I saw that paper."

Memories abruptly flood Clara's mind and she blinks, blind to the yellowed paper in her hands and the dust motes glistening in the air, a taut sense of unhappiness closing around her throat. For all the vagueness of Nancy's description, Clara knows exactly what the building is and its appearance hovers like a spectre before her mind's eye.

"You found the pavilion already?" Wade's voice is deeper than usual, quiet but still startling in the complete silence.

Nancy starts just slightly and turns to him. "Did I?" she replies, sinking into the chair he places on the porch. "I wasn't quite sure what the place was."

Wade looks at Clara, and once again a multitude of words lie hidden in his gaze. Forcing herself to nod, Clara finds herself gulping down a rush of nervousness.

"It's where Charlotte Thornton died," Wade says.


End file.
